The Enemy Among Us

Dinesh D'Souza explains why he believes the cultural left in America is responsible for 9/11.

Dinesh D'Souza, the Rishwain Research Scholar at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, is the author of several controversial books including "Illiberal Education," and "The End of Racism" as well as "The Virtue of Prosperity," and 'What's So Great About America." He recently spoke with Beliefnet's Washington editor, David Kuo, about his latest hot button book.

I think part of it is, also, that as someone who has grown up in a different culture, in my case Bombay, India, I tend to see America both from the outside as well as from the inside. I've grown up here, I live here, so I have this dual perspective that I think is helpful to my work by giving me an independent point of view.

On the other hand, I have developed a certain kind of fearlessness in taking on controversial issues, and my editor, Adam Bellow, has been really good in encouraging me to sort of follow an argument where it leads. And so, for example if I say that the radical Muslims are not against us because we support the Palestinians, but because they see us as a pagan, immoral society, my editor then pushes me. Well, are they right to say that? And if there's an element of truth in what they're saying, then how can we discourage the moderate or traditional Muslims from joining them? Or, how do we best answer those arguments? Or, if what they're saying is partly right about America, which America are they describing? Is it red America, or is it blue America?

So, in pushing the argument in this way, it sometimes leads into controversial territory, and apparently it's a place I don't hesitate to tread.

Falwell was making a different kind of argument, which to my mind is a sort of theological argument. He was saying, essentially, that the left has made America into a morally corrupt place. That we are, to use another famous phrase, “slouching towards Gomorrah.” And God became angry with us, and basically sent us 9/11 to punish us for our sins.

Now, my book eliminates this theological reasoning completely. I'm asking a clinical question. Why did the people who did this do it? It has nothing to do with God's intentions in the matter. I'm not appealing to any divine justice. I'm simply saying since we are now five years away from 9/11, and 9/11 was followed by a kind of understandable moment of national unity, in which people said, "We don't want to understand any of this. We just basically want to strike back at the guys who did it."